AT&T Q1 iPhone Activations Hit 4.8M

AT&T's most popular smartphone is still Apple's iPhone. The cell service provider reported it activated 4.8 million iPhones during its first fiscal quarter for 2013, making up some 80 percent of the company's smartphone sales.

AT&T activated 6 million smartphones during the quarter, which is down from the holiday quarter's 8 million units. In comparison, Verizon activated 4 million iPhones during the quarter, and Sprint activated 1.5 million.

Apple sold 37.4 million iPhones during the quarter, up year over from 35.1 million units. The company shared that figure during its March quarter earnings report earlier this week where it also announced US$43.6 billion in sales and earnings at $9.5 billion.

AT&T brought in 296,000 new subscribers, compared to Verizon's 677,000. Sprint, however, lost 560,000 subscribers during the quarter.

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The fight for cell service, and specifically iPhone, subscribers in the U.S. is between AT&T and Verizon. Sprint is left to take what's left, and now it gets to share some of that with T-Mobile. Despite the growing number of Android phone users, Apple's iPhone still looks like the favorite for consumers, and AT&T's first quarter activations help back that up.